CCTST Problem Solving 5 ā Questions and Answers
Question 1: A city's crime rate dropped after a new police chief was appointed. A resident concludes the chief caused the drop. What alternative explanation should be considered?
- The resident's reasoning is correct since timing is everything
- Crime rates naturally fluctuate due to economic and demographic factors unrelated to leadership (Correct answer)
- Police chiefs always reduce crime rates
- The prior chief was solely responsible for all crime
Correct answer: Crime rates naturally fluctuate due to economic and demographic factors unrelated to leadership
Post hoc reasoning mistakes temporal sequence for causation; external factors like economic changes may explain the crime rate drop independently.
Question 2: An engineer faces a design problem with no known solution. She decides to reframe it as: 'How might we achieve the same function with different materials?' This technique is called:
- Confirmation bias
- Problem reframing (Correct answer)
- Ad hoc reasoning
- Deductive elimination
Correct answer: Problem reframing
Problem reframing involves restating the problem from a different perspective to unlock new solution pathways not visible under the original frame.
Question 3: Which action reflects the highest level of critical thinking in the problem-solving process?
- Implementing the solution recommended by an authority figure
- Following established procedures without questioning their relevance
- Evaluating the effectiveness of a solution after implementation and revising accordingly (Correct answer)
- Selecting the most popular solution among colleagues
Correct answer: Evaluating the effectiveness of a solution after implementation and revising accordingly
The highest level of critical thinking includes reflective evaluationāassessing outcomes and adjusting based on evidence rather than treating the process as complete after implementation.
Question 4: A school finds that students who eat breakfast score higher on tests. The principal concludes that providing free breakfast will raise test scores for all students. The conclusion is:
- Valid because the correlation is strong
- Potentially flawed because students who eat breakfast may differ in other ways that affect scores (Correct answer)
- Invalid because nutrition has no effect on cognition
- Correct because the sample size is likely large
Correct answer: Potentially flawed because students who eat breakfast may differ in other ways that affect scores
Self-selection bias may mean breakfast-eating students differ systematically from non-eaters, making the causal inference from correlation unreliable.
Question 5: A project manager must decide under conditions of incomplete information and time pressure. The most defensible approach is to:
- Delay the decision until all information is available
- Make the best decision possible with available evidence while documenting assumptions (Correct answer)
- Defer to the highest-ranking team member's intuition
- Choose the option that minimizes personal accountability
Correct answer: Make the best decision possible with available evidence while documenting assumptions
When perfect information is unavailable, making a reasoned, documented decision with stated assumptions is the responsible and practical approach.
Question 6: Which of the following represents a constraint that should be identified early in the problem-solving process?
- The preferred solution of the team leader
- The historical background of the problem
- Available budget, time, and legal restrictions (Correct answer)
- The number of people affected by the problem
Correct answer: Available budget, time, and legal restrictions
Constraintsāsuch as budget, time, and legal limitsādefine the solution space and must be identified early to avoid investing effort in infeasible options.
Question 7: A team pilot-tests a new process in one department before rolling it out company-wide. This approach best demonstrates:
- Avoidance of commitment to the solution
- Risk management through small-scale testing before full implementation (Correct answer)
- Bias toward incremental change regardless of effectiveness
- Lack of confidence in the proposed solution
Correct answer: Risk management through small-scale testing before full implementation
Piloting allows identification of unanticipated problems on a small scale, reducing the risk and cost of a flawed full-scale rollout.
CCTST Problem Solving 5
A city's crime rate dropped after a new police chief was appointed.
A resident concludes the chief caused the drop.
What alternative explanation should be considered?